0750 Hrs Friday 8 May 2009
An EASTENDER comment about Spitalfields Housing Association is published by INSIDE HOUSING
Housing association probes Baroness Uddin’s second home status
Labour peer faces eviction
08/05/2009 | By Clara Story
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A Labour peer is being investigated and could face eviction after naming her housing association property as her second home.
Baroness Uddin, a tenant of Spitalfields Housing Association in east London, claimed in her House of Lords expenses for 2007/08 that her main residence was a flat in Kent.
She claimed £29,675 a year for overnight subsistence - the allowance for residency at a second home in London - in the same year.
But legally a tenant with an assured or secure tenancy must live in the social home as their ‘only or principal home’, meaning she could have breached her tenancy. Baroness Uddin is understood to share a joint tenancy on the home with her husband.
Although last year’s claim was the first in which she named the location of her main residence, Baroness Uddin has been claiming between £15,000 and £24,000 each year for overnight subsistence since 2001.
Asked whether Baroness Uddin faced eviction Omar Mapara, chief executive of Spitalfields Housing Association, said the association ‘is investigating this matter which it takes very seriously’.
‘We have written to her requesting that she confirms that she and her husband continue to occupy our property as their only or principal home and we await a response,’ he added.
Avril Smith, senior lawyer at Lawrence Graham, said: ‘If she maintains that the Maidstone property is her principal residence, she could fall into difficulty with her tenancy.’
Ms Smith confirmed the ultimate sanction available for the breach of a tenancy agreement could be the loss of the tenancy.
If the tenancy is joint with her husband, she could claim it was his main residence only, which could comply with the rules, Ms Smith added.
The baroness became the first Muslim woman life peer in 1998. She is named as a company director of business and management consultancy Manzil Associates.
Baroness Uddin said she welcomed the review of her expenses that will be carried out by the clerk of Parliament. She said she had not broken the rules of the House of Lords and would not comment further until the review was finished.
Readers' comments (1)
EastEnder | Fri, 8 May 2009 05:50 GMT
Your headline does not match the contents. From what you quote of the statement by the Spitalfields Housing Association it is not clear what codes of conduct that organisation itself has in place. Also, you do not suggest anything about the Spitalfields Housing Association itself. Did they in any way aid the behaviour by the particular individual? What is the record of the Housing Association in these matters. Has the media bothered to report on this and other so-called social landlords? What has been their role? And how if any are the management personnel of the Spitalfields Housing Association related to the Baroness of Bethnal Green politically?
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Poverty of the MPs is in the grotesque shamelessness... and petty greed
EAST LONDON PRESS says at 0510 Hrs on Tuesday 31 March 2009: It is not just Harry Cohen, the east London MP who used to flaunt a faker beard and spout strings of calculated socialistic confections... Having lost BOTH in order to stay on the bandwagon, Cohen seems to have also lost any sense of rationality. And dignity. How else could he be saying those things, comparing himself to Churchill in that way? There were indeed many flaws in Churchill’s life and character. But Harry Cohen is not remotely convincing as a comparable Member of Parliament...Or as a member of society... What Cohen’s banal boast tells us about him is that he belongs to a parliament of political, mental, moral pigmies with no evident shame...
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